Cat and Mouse
by Darkwood
Summary: Finished. What happened after Solitude.
1. I

**CB: Cat and Mouse, -I-**

I know she's here. The scent of her in the air is as potent as though she were wearing cheap perfume. I can see it written on every face in the room, I can almost see her walking through the door. I sidle up to the bar and the bartender disinterestedly asks me if I want something to drink.

I place an order, and then ask, "So if I'm looking for someone around these parts… where would I go to find 'em?"

"Depends on who you're looking for," the bartender responds, pouring my drink.

"A woman…" the noise of the door behind me chimes as it shuts, and I'm surprised I didn't feel the change in air pressure when she stepped in.

"Since when have you had trouble finding a woman, Spike?" she sits beside me and nods to the bartender, and he sets a second glass beside mine.

"Since you walked out," I respond, glancing over at her. She's still thin, pale skinned, and beautiful. I can't see her eyes with the sunglasses on.

"This is one of those cliché movie scenes isn't it?" she asks, sipping her drink, "Where you say, 'If I can't get you, I can't get anyone'?"

"No." I sip my own drink. "It's been a long time, Faye."

"A year or two. Nothing big," she responds, and turns, finally, to glance at me over the top of her sunglasses. "What are you doing here? Bounty?"

"No."

"I don't believe you. What, did Jette decide to stop in here and you didn't have a say in it?" she laughs lightly, "That sounds a bit more like it."

"I came looking for you."

And those words stop her short. She knocks back the glass and turns to me, crossing her impossibly long legs, and asks, "What do you want from me, Spike? Hmm? I'm not a housewife."

"When have I ever tried to make you a housewife, Faye?" I lean over, taking a deep breath near her neck, inhaling the scent of her skin and her shampoo over the smoke and liquor of the bar. "I don't recall doing that… unless my memory got knocked around as well that night."

"You chose a ghost over me," her voice is quiet, contemplative, and she leans slightly closer. "Julia's dead, Spike."

I reach out and put my hand on her leg, "And you aren't."

The force of the blow to my cheek makes my head spin and she picks her drink up again. "I deserved that."

"Yes, you did," her voice is clipped, simple. She lays down a few wulongs on the bar and stands up, stretching her arms over her head. "And it's not that easy, cowboy, I've moved on."

She leaves the bar, and I let her, but not without casting a glance after her. There was a bit too much hesitation in her voice during that last line. Maybe what Jette said before was right.

She doesn't have anywhere but the Bebop to return to, ultimately.

She'll be back.


	2. II

**CB: Cat and Mouse, -II-**

I leave the bar as quickly as I can manage while still maintaining my dignity. How did he find me? After so much time running, I guess I just got careless. It was reassuring, though, to think that I wasn't running for nothing. My heart sped up when he leaned over me, and it is a very nice thing to feel wanted, especially by someone you've grown to…

I shake my head, pressing my back against the wall once I'm far enough away that he can't just step outside and see me. The place on my leg where he put his hand is warm and burning, the way I've missed his hands. Not that I've been waiting around for him… just…

The memory of him has been more vivid than anyone else I've come across in the past three years. I tip my head back against the cool, rough stone of the building and let one of the memories wash over my mind.

*

It was maybe the second or third time when we'd fought ourselves right into the bedroom, and wore each other out. He had passed out some time after we finished, and I found myself with his face nestled against my chest, and arm possessively tucked around my waist. I thought he was asleep, from the even rise and fall of his back with his breathing, but as I took another drag off of my cigarette, his free hand came up and lifted it from my lips.

"Hey!"

"Haven't we had enough fighting for one day?" he asked in a contented sounding voice as he hauled himself effortlessly up onto an elbow over me, the cigarette hanging from his lips. "I thought you were tired." His off-color eyes searched my face and I found myself feeling rather vulnerable under his gaze.

"I thought you were sleeping," was the only reply I had for him. I glanced up at the ceiling to avoid the piercing look he had been favoring me with. He smirked. "Were you asleep at all?"

"How could I sleep with that sort of a cushion?" I was tempted to slap him, except that the rest of him was completely inoffensive at that moment. His hands hadn't moved to accentuate his words, and his expression was even and relaxed.

"You're horrible," I muttered instead, turning my head to the side and letting my hair fall over my face. And then I felt his hand gently brush the hair from my face, and his fingers trace my cheekbone. Trying not to breathe, I hoped only that he wouldn't take it off of my skin, but even holding myself rigidly still didn't keep up the gentle contact for long. He reached over me to tap the ashes of the cigarette into the ashtray by the bed and then put it back into my lips, shifting his body slightly to lay with his face pressed into the pillow.

I blinked, slightly confused at the arm still looped around my waist, and finished my cigarette, leaning back against the pillows and turning my head to glance at him.

"Get some sleep Faye," he muttered, absently, in a half-asleep voice.

It was the hand that I couldn't ignore.

And because I didn't want him to get up and go to his own room just yet, I closed my eyes and concentrated on the feeling of the hand on my back, and eventually sleep took me.

*

Opening my eyes slowly, I find a man uncomfortably close, with drool coming out of the corner of his mouth. "How much?" he asks.

Narrowing my eyes, I pull my gun, and press it against his temple, "More than you can afford, friend."

Getting the hint, he backs away, slowly, with his hands raised, and I tuck the gun away, shoving my hands into the pockets of my jacket and heading off for what passes for home at the moment.


	3. III

**CB: Cat and Mouse, -III-**

"Jette, are you awake?"

"Spike… where the hell are you?"

"A little dump I doubt you've ever heard of," comes his non-committal response. He's obviously calling from the Swordfish, I can tell by the reception. "It's going to take a while before I make it back…"

"You've found her then," I reply with a sigh.

"You don't sound so pleased at that."

"The two of you together equals one big ball of trouble, and I don't know if this ship and I can handle it any more. I'm getting old, Spike."

"You're not getting any older than you already are, Jette," comes his gentle, sarcastic reply. "Besides, like you said, I'm only human. If you want me to end up dead in a hurry, you can keep sending me out on bounties with you without anything to return to."

"You act like she's going to sit back and wait for you to come home, Spike," I shake my head. "She's not that kind of girl."

His voice goes distant as he responds, and the look on his face suddenly goes blank. "Neither was Julia." It seems that comment has sobered him sufficiently, and he glances down. "I won't make the same mistakes, Jette."

"Well you're making one of the same ones now, you idiot, if a woman doesn't want you around, she'll let you know, and I think abandoning you while you were recovering was the biggest and most obvious clue she's ever given you that she wants nothing to do with you, Spike."

"But she tells me otherwise with every move she makes, Jette," there's the old grin on his face again, the reminiscent one. "Let me know if something big comes up."

And he cuts the transmission.

I lean back in the chair and put my feet up on the edge of the control panel. He never was much of a talker, and in a lot of ways I don't think I ever really knew Spike very well. We have a lot of different ideas about things, different approaches.

I remember I once told him that he was all about instinct and reflexes. I think that may be exactly what's going on right now. His gut is telling him he needs Faye around, or maybe some other part of his lower anatomy, and so he's gone after her.

I just don't know if his instincts are enough to convince her.


	4. IV

**CB: Cat and Mouse, -IV-**

She's leaning against the railing, a pair of black binoculars up to her eyes, watching the horses race around their little circular track. It seems, though, that for once she's not betting on them. I walk up and stand next to her, and she doesn't comment for a long moment before saying, "I thought stalking was illegal."

"It's not really stalking, is it?"

She glances at me, a faint curl of her painted lips the only response she gives me to that question, and my body starts to itch for her. It happened when I woke up, which is what had me thrashing against Jette to get off the Bebop and after her, but once I'd healed a bit, it seemed to disappear.

Until a few weeks ago, when I thought I saw her on an advertisement for swimsuits, and my body went cold and stiff. And then the itch started again.

"So would you mind telling me what you're really doing here, Spike?" she lets the binoculars hang down around her neck, "and don't say looking for me. Unless there's some bounty on my head that I don't know about?"

"No. No bounty," I reply, finding my eyes forcing themselves away from her. I can't stand to look at her for long, because I stop thinking, and I'm not going to be able to get her back if I can't think straight.

She's too smart for that. She's never been a puppy that would follow me around.

She's much more like a cat, achingly independent, but domesticated all the same. I lean against the railing, hands spread to bear up my weight as I watch the race she was just watching, and finally see the single ticket clutched in her hand.

She arches a brow at me, and I chuckle. "You never change, do you, Faye?" I ask in a soft voice.

"No," comes her quiet response, "no I suppose I don't." She turns to face the race as well, and leans on the railing, but one of her hands lands right on top of mine. I turn to look over at her, and find that she isn't paying any attention to me… her entire being seems focused on the horse race.

And then the thundering hoof beats come to an end, and they're announcing the winner over the loudspeaker. I start to say something, but she hushes me. "Oh my god," she says quietly, the pale, smaller hand on mine gripping it tightly as she turns towards me, voice raising as she repeats, "Oh my god! Spike… I won!"

In another moment, I find myself with my arms full of her, and she's holding tightly onto me, and I close my eyes and soak in her warmth and the smell of her hair before she pulls away and starts jumping up and down excitedly.

"But how much have you lost today?" I can't help but ask as she struts her way over to the cashier.

"Nothing. That was my only bet," she says in a proud, stubborn voice. "Come on, Spiegel," she turns to cast an appraising glance over her shoulder, "I think this is cause for a celebration."


	5. V

**CB: Cat and Mouse, -V-**

I can't exactly say what I thought she meant when she said it was time to celebrate, but I don't think it was this. Leaving the racetrack she seemed different, much younger and more carefree, as she has a habit of seeming to me from time to time. We headed down the street, and she felt free enough to slip her arm through mine, something she's never done in public.

At heart, I guess even Faye likes to feel that she belongs. I'm reassured that she can feel that way with me around.

And then she turned us into a bath house.

And I started to wonder if she was crazy.

She shoves me towards a changing room, and heads off into another one.


	6. VI

**CB: Cat and Mouse, -VI-**

It is easy to forget, when wearing clothes, just what you look like without them on. After changing into my towel and slipping into the water, I lean my head back against the smooth rim of the tub when I heard the other door open, and felt the level of the water rise around my neck as he slipped down into the water.

"This isn't exactly what I'd call a celebration, Faye."

"Some of us do more than drink ourselves stupid when we're happy, Spike," I answer, and feel the ripples of him chuckling.

"You never did quite approve of that."

"I still don't."

There is a long moment of silence, and I feel his eyes on me for a moment, as tangibly as I feel them go away when he looks elsewhere, turning his eyes up to the ceiling or to the walls around us. And then he shifts in the water, and his foot brushes against mine.

A jolt of electricity passes through me as it happens, and my eyes snap open to look at him. He hasn't noticed. Or at least he shows no sign of having noticed what he's just done to me. And then he tilts his head down, and his eyes, mis-matched and dangerous, meet mine.

I feel drunk on his presence.

And he knows it.

Damn him, but he knows it.

We sit there, in silence, and then he speaks. "You're really tense lately."

"What do you know about it?" I feel color rising to my cheeks, both from the heat of the steam bath and from his comment. "I haven't seen you much lately."

"By choice," he says, and lifts his head, meeting my eyes with his.

"We all make choices, Spike."

He nods and remains silent for a long moment. "I'm trying to make one now." Ever so slowly, he slips across the bench towards me, keeping his eyes locked on mine.

I take a deep breath and hold it. He's close enough so that I can feel his breathing. He lifts a hand to my cheek. "I don't know how to do this, Spike," I say, turning my head to lean it into his hand.

"What's to know, Faye?" his voice is gentle, and he leans forward to kiss my cheek. His lips are soft. "I don't exactly know how to do it either… but I know how I feel, and that's enough for me."

I swallow, nervous. My shoulders are tensing despite the warm persuasions of the water. "I…"

He gently brushes his fingertips down my cheek and lets his hand trail away, leaning forward to kiss my lips in the same gentle, tender manner that he kissed my cheek. "You don't trust me." He sits back against the wall of the bath next to me.

I close my eyes, turning my head slightly from his in a jerk. "No," I say, finally realizing the truth. "I don't trust me." I gather the wet towel against my chest with one hand and stand, scrambling out of the tub and back towards the changing room. I almost miss his startled question.

"Don't trust yourself to what?"


	7. VII

** CB: Cat and Mouse, -VII-**

I dress with the feeling of being watched, but nothing happens in the bath house. I make it all the way to the parking lot where I plan to catch the bus back to where I left my ship before the guy that's been following me catches up with me. I drop the cigarette from my mouth and crush it under the toe of my shoe.

"You."

I lift my eyes from the path I was taking and greet the person that is waiting for me. He stands before me, dressed sharply and distinctively like someone from the syndicate. On closer inspection, he has the cut and trim of a Red Dragon about him. "I don't believe we've been properly introduced."

"You killed Vicious."

"You've got the wrong guy, I didn't kill anyone." I shove my hands into the pockets of my pants, tilting my head down into the collar of my shirt. "I'm just another guy whose lost and looking for the way home."

"I don't quite believe you."

"Well that's just too bad, isn't it?"

"Yes, it is, but not for me."

"What do you mean?"

"It's really worse for that lady friend of yours than it is for either of us," he replies, inclining his head across the parking lot towards something that is behind me.

I turn and know, before my eyes reach the point, what will be waiting for my sight once I turn to make it out. Faye, with a gloved hand held tightly over her mouth and a knife at her delicate, pale throat.

"What is it you want?" I reply. I am not disappointed in the sad expectation. "And why bother with innocent women? She's a pretty one, though."

"I think she's a little less than innocent when it comes to you, Spiegel," the man's voice draws my eyes from her, thankfully. If I looked any longer I'd give away how concerned I really am. "And I think that once you've decided to come around, you'll come tell me what I want to know."

He meets my eyes with a chuckle.

"In the meantime, we'll just have a little fun with your girlfriend." He jerks his head to his accomplice, and I'm certain she's being dragged into the alley and out of sight. They know me, and they know her. We were both on the rooftop when they dragged Vicious' dead body away on Mars.

And they saw her drag me, limping and barely alive, out of the ruins.

I guess I'm just no good for women.

"You can come to the Gray Stone Tavern when you've decided you've had it with the suspense."

I grit my teeth, and shrug, reaching for another cigarette. The man glares, eyes narrowing, and brushes past me.


	8. VIII

**CB: Cat and Mouse, -VIII-**

The blade is sharp against my skin, and I can feel it cutting into my throat as I'm jerked along down the alleyway. I saw the look in Spike's eyes when he saw that they had me. If I hadn't known from what he said in the bath how he felt about me… that would be enough to tell me.

I was too scared, when they grabbed me, still trying to get myself properly dressed on my quick way out the door, to fight back. But with the leather gloved hand clamped over my mouth, and the painful danger of the knife at my throat, I can't do much more than walk carefully with my hands bound behind my back.

And then I hear the gunshot, and the knife gets closer to my throat.

"Your boyfriend just did something really stupid, honey," comes the dark voice.

But I know it wasn't Spike.

He wouldn't put me in that sort of danger.

"This way."

The insistent tug on my head comes and the knife grazes my neck. I hiss in pain as the blade scores my skin. I scar.

And then I hear the footsteps.

They are running quickly, and too heavy to be Spike's.

I glance up, eyes wide, and see a very large, hulking figure dropping from a fire escape nearby, hands clasped high above his head as he lowers his clasped fists on the large Red Dragon's head.

Startled, he drops the knife, but keeps his grip on my mouth, forcing me to duck forward as he bends and avoids the blow. Jette lands heavily on the concrete, and I jam the heel of my boot into the jerk's groin, darting forward and losing my balance to take a spill on the damp concrete of the alley.

There are more footsteps, and I roll out of the way as Jette engages the Red Dragon that held me captive, working my way up to my knees and not caring how dirty I'm getting in the process. The alley smells of garbage, and so does my fresh, clean hair.

The two of them scuffle behind me, and I work ineffectually on the plastic ties on my wrists, only succeeding in cutting into my skin with them, painfully. There is the noise of a body falling behind me. The noise is heavy and damp in the relative quiet of the alley, and then a strong hand jerks me to my feet by the elbow.

"Come on."

Thankfully, it's Jette's voice. It is clean and clear over the thud of my heartbeat and my own heavy, ragged breathing. I nod, and he doesn't even bother to undo the bindings on my arms before shoving me along out of the alley. As we enter the parking lot, I see something confusing.

Spike is in the middle of a fight, and he's getting beaten.

"Spike, let's get out of here!" Jette calls, still shoving me before him.

I didn't know he'd called Jette in on this. I thought it was between the two of us.

Spike risks a glance, and then seems to shake his head, as though he can't believe I'm there. Safe and relatively unharmed. His fighting seems to regain its lost momentum, and he sprints over to catch up with us after dispatching the small knot of his attackers.


	9. IX

**CB: Cat and Mouse, -IX-**

The ride back to the Bebop is going to be cramped, but Jette doesn't ask questions when I guide her by her shoulders over to the Swordfish II. And she doesn't say a word as I settle her innocently across my lap, taking the controls in hand.

Whatever else is between us, she accepts this, and leans her head against my shoulder, her nose tickling my neck and the trickle of sweat slipping down the side of my face. She's safe, and she's as worn out emotionally as I am physically. There are bruises up and down my torso, I'm sure, and probably a cracked or broken rib.

It hurts even to have the slight pressure of her weight on me, but it is a hurt that I enjoy enduring. And the trip is only a short one. Despite the smell of garbage lingering on her from the alleyway, I breathe deeply of the scent of her underneath it, and am somehow comforted in it, and also to find that she is dozing slightly.

I land carefully on the deck of the ship and slowly taxi into the dock, followed by Jette in the Hammerhead. She startles awake and climbs down carefully as soon as the hatch is open, somehow managing to do it all without the use of her hands.

Jette and I exchange a look as she scrambles up the stairs towards the lounge, but neither of us say anything yet.


	10. X

**CB: Cat and Mouse, -X-**

Back on the Bebop, the two of them can't even look at one another, and it starts to drive me nuts. Faye hasn't even asked to have the plastic ties cut off of her wrists. And I saw that they were bleeding when I rescued her.

"You two could've been killed!" I finally burst out. "Spike, I told you that running off like that would get you in trouble."

"It was worth it."

She lifts her head from her silent contemplation of her dirty, scraped up knees, and slowly looks at him. The expression on her face is unreadable to me. And he is staring at my bonsai, so he's not turned to regard her. No luck there.

"You mean you didn't call Jette?" her words are soft, almost disbelieving.

"Call me? Hell he didn't call me, he didn't even tell me where he was. I had to follow the tracker in his communicator once I got word that the Blue Phoenix had moved onto Venus to work out some left over business they had with the Red Dragons. The entire thing is even more disturbing because that part of Venus is White Tiger territory."

Her gaze sobers, and she glances at me. "Cut my hands loose, would you?"

"Me?"

"Yes, Jette. You should've done it earlier. My wrists are bleeding."

"Don't look at me like that. He's supposed to be the knight in shining armor, I just-" She stops me with a look.

"You were the one to save me from that guy," she points out, absently.

With a grumble, I pull my knife and step over to her, cutting her arms free. She rolls her shoulders and rubs the scabbing cuts on her wrists before standing. "Where do you think you're going?"

"I stink. I smell like garbage and I'm bloody. I'm going to take a shower." The bloody zip ties from her wrists hit the floor as she stands, brushed easily from her lap.

I start to protest, but Spike turns his head to give me a look over his shoulder, and I fall silent. "You can use my robe," he offers, but she disappears up the stairs without commenting.

"You don't really think she's going to stick around, do you?"

"I don't know," he replies, turning to look up the staircase after her.

"But you want her to."

He gives me a look and then rubs his jaw with one hand. "The Blue Phoenix were there, you say? That would explain the gunshots."

I nod. "I got a tip from an old ISSP buddy of mine. He said that there was some sort of a ruckus… that some of the remnants of the Red Dragons had invaded the White Tiger territory. Thought I should know." I glance intently at Spike, and he brushes the hair back from his forehead, almost nostalgically. "Something about the Dragons wanting an answer. Something about Vicious."

"I'm not who I used to be," Spike replies, turning to head up the stairs, in the same finalized manner that she did.

"Huh. Sure you aren't. I don't see much difference."


	11. XI

**CB: Cat and Mouse, -XI-**

I don't bother to knock before stepping into the bathroom. The shower is running, and I know she heard the door open. "Close the door, you're letting cold air in."

I press the close sequence on the keypad and step closer to the shower curtain, tracing her silhouette against the hanging plastic with my fingers. "Did you come to bring me a towel?"

"I thought I might return the favor you keep doing me, bandaging me up all the time." I respond, leaning against the wall. I light a cigarette.

"That's nothing that we need to discuss while I'm naked in the shower." Her voice is chiding, "Don't smoke in here."

"We smoke everywhere else. Besides, are people ever anything but naked when in the shower?" I tap the ashes into the toilet and take a deep breath of the scent in the air. The entire room smells distinctly of her.

"You got the point." Fresh and clean and…

"Yes, I did."

She resumes washing herself, and there is silence for a long moment. "So I take it there is a reason you came in here, right?"

"Five years ago I left the Red Dragons, and turned my back on the Syndicate." The words are out of my mouth before I know what exactly I'm saying. She is silent for a long moment, and I don't know if she's heard me.

And then the shower water turns off.

"There was a friendly rivalry between Vicious and I, when we were younger, over who would become the next head of the family. He was the grandson of one of the old guard father's of the Red Dragons, but they told him, early on, that he would never be the next leader of the family." I pause, seeing if she's listening. "They chose me instead."

"And something else." She lifts a pale hand and draws the shower curtain open. "Julia." She really is naked in the shower, and apparently, she doesn't care if I know it. "He wanted her."

"He had her," I reply, "but Julia loved me," I hear myself say, looking hard into her eyes and trying not to stray my gaze from them.

"It killed her," she says, taking a step towards me and putting her hands on the collar of my shirt. My eyes are drawn to them. She pulls me forward a step. "Vicious killed her because of it. He couldn't have her, and so he killed you. But you didn't die, and so he had her killed, to get to you. And then you killed him."

"Your wrists are really cut… did they hurt you?"

"Five years ago… I don't know what I'm saying, you've heard it all, and I'm still as lost as I was then. More so. It's easy to get lost when you're trying to look back and remember something just outside of your grasp."

I put a hand to her cheek, and tilt her face up to mine, pressing my lips against her forehead. "You told me to stop living in the past, and I tried." She leans against me, and even through my clothing I can feel the warm dampness of her body where she leans against me. "But instead I latched onto you. And then you died."

"I didn't die," I say, slipping one arm around her waist. "I woke up."

"You died," she says, leaning her head against my shoulder. "Just like she did."

I lift my other hand to stroke her short wet hair. After a long pause I add, "The White Tigers aren't going to let this go that easy."

"The White Tigers? I thought Jette said it was the Blue Phoenix that followed the Red Dragons onto Venus."

"He did."

"Then what have they got to do with this?"

"It wasn't a Blue Phoenix that fired the shot in the parking lot. It was one of the White Tigers."

She turns her head slightly and presser her cheek against my neck. "Well, whatever. I don't care what they think, I worked long and hard to get this far, Spike, and I'm not going to give it up. White Tigers or Blue Phoenix, it doesn't matter to me," there is something feral in her voice. Something dangerous that I have never heard there. Something that reminds me very much of how Julia spoke to me before the end.

The same phrase in different words.

_ "Then I'll be with you, until the end."_

Not again. I put my arms tightly around her shoulders and hold her against me, closing my eyes and burying my face against her wet hair. She swallows, tightening her fingers on my shirt, "That's why you went after Vicious, isn't it?"

"She didn't want to, the first time. When I left the Syndicate, she stayed behind. And then the second time-," I hear my own voice say, but my eyes are closed tightly. It's not entirely true. She wanted to be free of it. It was the only way. "She wanted to run away, to disappear… but he wouldn't let us."

"And you want to, now."

"I don't remember what it's like to not be fighting, Faye." She tips her head towards me and puts her lips against my neck. "Ever since I was adopted by Mao… I thought that it might be nice to know, for a little while."

"And Jette?" she asks softly, her breath tickling my skin.

"He's wanted me off the ship for a long time," I reply, letting my hand slip down her wet back. The water has long been turned off, but it still clings to her skin, making it soft and precious.

"You're wrong," she says, burrowing into me for another moment before she lets go and pushes on my chest hard enough to send me staggering backwards. I notice the blush on her cheeks as she pulls the shower curtain closed. "And I was in the middle of a shower. If you don't have a towel then whatever else it is you have to say can be said after I'm done."

Nodding my head, I retreat towards the doorway. "There are towels in the cabinet. Where they've always been."


	12. XII

**CB: Cat and Mouse, -XII-**

She waltzes out of the bathroom and down into the common room wearing his robe. Her short hair is bound in a towel tightly, and she is smiling, and humming a little. "What are you so happy about? Last I checked, there was another Syndicate family that wants you dead."

"The Syndicate and I have danced this dance before," she says, her voice sharp. "It'll likely turn out the same way it always does."

"What about him?" I ask.

She freezes in her tracks.

"What about who?"

"Don't play dumb with me. What about Spike?"

There is quiet for a long while, and then she speaks. "You're being fatherly again, Jette. Spike can take care of himself. He always has."

"Spike needs someone to protect. And from what I've seen, you're not offering him that."

"What he needs is for you to let him live his life." She sounds offended, and I notice her shoulders tighten in the robe she's wearing, she pulls it closed more around her. "Spike will be just fine the way that he is!" She stamps her bare foot on the ground and the towel falls from her hair.

I cross, picking it up off the floor behind her, and offer it to her.

"He came back from the dead for you, you know?"

When she finally turns around, I can see it in her eyes. She knows just as well as I do how he feels about her. I didn't need to say a word.

"I know," she replies in an equally soft voice, taking the towel in both hands and holding it to her chest.

"He could've gone after her, again."

"He didn't."

I nod. She lowers her eyes to the towel and doesn't say anything for a long moment. "I know," she says again. "Is my old room the way I left it?"

And I hate to admit to her that it is. But I can't lie to her right now, not when she's feeling as lost as she looks swimming in the oversized robe of his.

Faye is a beautiful woman. Her pale skin is creamy and those eyes…

But I am too old for her.

And I've had my fill of women for this life time.

"Yes."

"I don't have anything clean to put on, so I guess I'll have to do laundry when we stop later."

"I don't intend on stopping until I've gotten the two of you far away from here. So you may be in those clothes for a while." I fold my arms and turn to head back for the bridge. If nothing else, this is still my ship.

"Hey! That's not very nice."

"Neither is a bullet to the back of the skull. Or the temple. Or the chest. Neither is having your bones shattered and the nerves in your arm severed and beyond repair. But you know what, that's life. Deal with the clothes Faye, let me deal with your safety." I head towards the exit, up the stairs and to the left.

"Why… why did you save us?"

Her voice makes me stop in the doorway. I could ignore her right now, but no, that would be cruel. "Because I know what it's like being on this ship alone, and I don't want to do it anymore," I reply, glancing back to look at her. She's standing with her back to me and the towel still held in her hands. Filled with silent dignity. "Maybe. Or maybe I just didn't want to see what he worked so hard to finally get his hands on crumble the way it always does. There's nothing wrong with Spike."

"You and I are the only people alive who think that way, anymore, Spike."

"Then maybe we're the only sane people left."

"He's not easy to get along with, you know." Her voice echoes after me as I make a move to enter the doorway. "I don't blame people for not being able to see past that. It's only natural. People want the simple things."

"Did you?"

"For a long time, yes. I did."

Whatever else she has to say, she can say later. I step out into the hallway and wait for the entrance to the bridge to swing around.


	13. XIII

**CB: Cat and Mouse, -XIII-**

"All I'm saying is that right now we've got no food, no money, and a lot more heat than we had a week ago."

It's a while later and the three of us are on the bridge. Jette's seated in the pilot chair and Spike and I are standing looking over the display unit of the navigational computer. Jette's been having a one-sided argument for the last ten minutes as neither of us have said a word.

"You're wrong, Jette, we just know about the heat we've had and not known anything about," Spike speaks up, and though I'm not exactly looking at him, I know he's staring Jette straight in the eye. He turns those mismatched eyes on me, and I look down.

"If it's such a problem for you boys, I'll leave."

"No," the two of them say it at the same time, and for what I'm sure are entirely different reasons. They look at one another with this incredulous look, hands slammed on the display panel in the middle of the cockpit, and I can't help but smile, a little, despite it all.

"You shouldn't go anywhere… alone, not now," Spike's eyes have left me, but I can feel he's still paying rapt attention to me. He's turned and is looking out the windows on the bridge. It's Ganymede.

"I can take care of myself, you know." The protesting voice isn't my own, though it comes from my throat. I don't want to leave. Not alone. I don't know if I'm strong enough to. Not again.

"A damn lot of good that's going to do either of you now. We're coming in to land. I want both of you to get lost on Ganymede for a while. Lay low. Real low."

"With what? Last I checked you just said that we don't have any money."

"We don't," Jette says, turning to look me in the eye, "but last time I checked, you did."

"Hey, that money's mine. I won it fair and square."

"And I'm asking you to use it to keep you and Spike alive, Faye. I'm not asking you to do something charitable."

"Oh great, next thing I know you'll be asking me to donate to the old women's and orphan's homes."

"I can't make you do anything, Faye. But I'd rather not take any chances with your lives. If you won't do it then-"

Spike hasn't said a word through all of this, and my eyes meet his back where he stands, still, looking out the front windows. Doesn't he even care that we're standing here arguing about his life? Doesn't he care… a little?

He stiffens, I know he can feel my eyes on him.

It's enough.

"I'll do it."

For now.

"Just because I said you shouldn't be alone doesn't mean you have to take care of me," Spike replies, turning finally to meet my eyes. "I'd rather you just-"

"Well frankly I don't care what you'd rather, it's my ass on the line here, so just get over it." I fold my arms. He folds his in response, our eyes meet in silence for a long moment.

Jette interrupts our silent war of gazes. "Regardless of all that, we've got to land in the harbor and dock first. After that, it's probably better if I don't even know where you are," Jette heads over to the helm, his voice sounding wearier than I remember it.

We both start talking at the same time, "If you think you're going to force me into this-force you? You'd be forcing me!" And we're saying exactly the same things.

"Get off my bridge if you're going to squabble like little children!"


	14. XIV

**CB: Cat and Mouse, -XIV-**

"So, you think he meant it?" I ask her as we walk across back down to the lounge.

"About what?"

"Getting lost on Ganymede."

She glances at me sideways. "I'm fairly sure he did."

"So are you up to it?"

"You're the one that just got beaten to a pulp."

"I'll take that as a yes. Do you need anything from your room?"

"Everything I have is on my back," she says, eyes sharp as she looks at me. "You?"

"There's nothing here on the Bebop that I can't live without, indefinitely."

"So as soon as he lands, let's get off the ship. It's probably best if we don't even tell him we've left."

I just nod, and she pauses as the ship rocks slightly. We've put down in water. I palm open the hatch to the hangar. "Come on." She blinks and stares at the hand I extend towards her, but takes it and allows me to help her down into the hangar.

There's a noise as I open the hangar doors onto the deck. The Bebop is pulling up to the dock, and I lean over the edge to glance down at it as the ship slows. She comes to stand behind me and I hop off the edge.

"Can't you even wait for a ladder?"

"Then Jette would see us leaving," I say, reaching up my hands to her. "I'll catch you. It's only a couple of feet."

She frowns, looking disdainfully at me. Her eyes speak volumes of how much she'd rather just wait a minute or two, but she sits down on the edge of the deck, and walks herself forward, slipping down over the edge.

I step up quickly, lifting my arms to her hips, letting her body slide down against mine until I can catch her under the arms and set her on her feet. She's really rather light, when it comes down to it.

"Under different circumstances," I mutter under my breath. She laughs, once, and brushes her fingers across the back of my hand.

"Come on," she says, stepping past me.

Helpless, I follow.


	15. XV

**CB: Cat and Mouse, -XV-**

Ganymede is to the White Tigers as Mars is to the Red Dragons. I learned it long after I woke up and had my run in with Whitney. Lucky for me I've never had any problems here, though I'm not so sure about Spike. He keeps looking over his shoulder as the two of us head into the streets, turning our collars up against prying eyes.

We need to get off the streets. I feel my hackles raising in response to his. And there's an itch between my shoulder blades. I grab his hand and tug him down one of the alleyways that I'm fairly familiar with, heading over to the small, hole in the wall hotel that's sitting at the end of it.

Washington Avenue. The Holiday Inn.

Names I remember from a time I only recently seem to have gotten over.

But I haven't, not really. I'm not that kind of girl.

The weight of the gun in my pocket is heavy, it feels like, in comparison to the rest of me. The gravity on Ganymede is supposedly comparable to that on earth, but suddenly my entire body feels heavy, and it takes an effort just to move my feet one after the other.

Spike looks down at me in question as I lead him into the lobby. I step up to the receptionist's desk and ring the bell.

"If we have to play this game of cat and mouse with them… I plan to be prepared for their next strike. And wandering the streets waiting to catch a bullet in the back isn't ever the best idea."

The look in Spike's eyes as he meets mine with them is comforting. Odd, and at the same time very consoling. I find it hard to focus on his eyes, because they are different, and so close together. I lean against the counter and feel the fabric of my jacket as it slides up my back. He'd rather not be doing this, I know.

He'd rather run.

But he'll stand and fight if he has to. Even a cornered mouse can turn into a tiger.

The receptionist, an older looking gentleman with kind eyes that's nearly blind, steps up and smiles. "How may I help you two?" his voice is accented.

"We need a room," I say, cocking my hips over towards Spike. The receptionist blinks once, but nods without commenting, and turns his large book around to me, pointing at a spot for me to sign.

"You take fourth room on third floor, near stairs," he says, turning to retrieve a key and sets it down next to the book. "Fifty wulong a night." I reach into my jacket pocket and hold up a card, which the man swipes through a machine that looks as old as I feel right now, and then returns to me. "Thank you and enjoy your stay at the Holiday Inn."


	16. XVI

**CB: Cat and Mouse, -XVI-**

"Wanna play a game?" she asks me, bored, seated on the single bed in the crummy hotel across from the one chair in the room where I'm lounging and watching the television. It's turned up pretty loud, to drown out the silence. And to show us where we are. The images cause a multi-colored glow to spread across the room, occasionally going dark and occasionally so bright as to be almost blinding. We tried the light, but the bulb is either broken or the plug is shorted out. So the television is partially for light, and partially because I had nothing better to do and I'm trapped in a room with her.

"Game?" I ask, turning to look at her. Her face is half dark, as she turns to look at me, and half blue from the commercial that's playing.

"You know. Cards?" she raises her voice over the noise of the television.

"I thought you'd given up gambling."

"I never said that."

"It'll make us a lot less conspicuous if you don't go out gambling."

"Look, I'm not talking about going out and gambling. I'm talking about you and me playing a game of cards."

"All right." I mute the television.

She smiles and leans over to fish a deck of cards out of her jacket. I can't keep my eyes from following the lines of her body in that barely there outfit, and she knows it. "So, what are we playing for?" she asks, slowly pulling the deck from her jacket and perching on the bed.

"I want some information out of you." The other half of that sentence is unsaid. The why. The, 'Because you won't tell me if I don't force you. Because I can't get to know you without applying just the right pressure to you and this was your idea so I'll play your game, but by my own rules, and for my own stakes.'

"Is that all?" her voice falls and she rolls her eyes, tilting her head back as she does so to reveal her neck to me. Again, my eyes are drawn to it, and the pattern glowing on it in the flickering light of the television. The room seems a little small, even for one person, and we've got the shades drawn.

"I don't think we need to play strip poker to make that sort of an advances at one another." I shift, slightly, in my seat. She knows exactly what affect she has on people. And I'm no exception.

Her cheeks color a little, but it's hard to tell because at that moment the flickering light goes to dark as the television screen goes dark with only white titles emblazoned across it. She lowered her chin, causing her hair to fall forward and obscure her face. And it's funny that she can be modest about something, when we know each other so well. But then again I guess we don't, if we did I wouldn't be playing this game with her for what I said I was.

Or that she can be modest about something when she's dressed like that. In a room, a single room, with me and nothing to do for a while but… "Fine. We'll play for information then."

She glances at me from under her bangs. The light comes back, red this time, and though I can't see her eyes from the under the shadow of the fall of her hair, I can tell there's something in her eyes that tells me she's unsure about this. She lifts her eyes properly to mine, the fall of her hair moving back from obscuring her features, and I can see her face now, a bit better. The faint blush on her cheeks is all that betrays her slight embarrassment.

But the light changes on the television again and I can't tell if I really saw a blush on her pale cheeks or if it was just a trick of the light.

"Poker."

I nod.


	17. XVII

**CB: Cat and Mouse, -XVII-**

Royal Flush. His hand.

"Ok, so what were you doing on that casino?"

I bite my lower lip. I did agree to this after all. I glance up at him, to see if he's serious. The look in his eyes in the flickering television glow says that he is. I should've kept this little obsession to myself. Crossing the two, that with him, I mean, never does any good. Crossing disciplines rarely does, for anyone, least of all me. "Casino?" I ask, and I can hear myself stalling.

"Where we found you, two years ago." He continues to look across at me evenly.

"I owe a lot of money," I say, glancing over at the commercial that's on. There are a lot of them, it seems. No where to turn to there. I look back at him and finish what I plan to answer of his question. "Ricardo, the guy who owned it, caught me and knew that, so he used it against me." I look away from his eyes. Something about them is too prying. I don't want to be any closer to him right now… not like this…

"That wasn't an answer," he says in a soft voice.

"You want to know more, win another hand," I say, glancing at him challengingly. To his credit, he doesn't shrink from it.

"Deal the cards," he says, looking across the spread out cards on the bed and into my eyes. And he doesn't argue with my decision. Pushing me, but not too much, I guess. I can handle that. I gather the cards up quickly, afraid to look at him all of a sudden. I know this feeling. It's the same one that I got when I looked at Julia across her cigarette.

I bet this is how she felt when he asked her all the same sorts of questions he's asking me now. I bet she felt just as scared of answering them… of having someone know her that well.

He reaches into the pocket of his jacket, I see out of the edge of my vision, and scoops up a pack of cigarettes, politely offering me one.

But then, maybe she was a different type of person than I am.

I take the cigarette, shuffling the deck.

Maybe Julia was comfortable with this sort of personal space invasion.

He flips open his lighter, and instinctually, I breathe in to catch the fire on the tobacco. He lifts his cards. He sets two down, and takes a cigarette for himself, eyes watching me so closely that I'm half afraid to breathe.

I keep the cards in my hand, and deal him two.

Four of a kind. Queens. My hand.

I'm not.

"So, ask." He leans over and offers me the ashtray from the bedside table. In response I nod slightly and tap the ashes from my cigarette into it before reaching down to scoop up the cards from between us.

And I ask the first thing that comes to mind. I think it's what he wanted out of this. Honesty. Spontaneity. "Was she comfortable with you asking so many questions?"

"She?"

I glance at him over the cards as I gather them up again to reshuffle. He taps the ashes from his cigarette into the small plastic ashtray and lowers his eyes a moment. He knows who I mean. He has to.

"Not really." He pauses, taking a deep breath. I can feel the expansion of his chest as he does so, and the warmth of the cigarette that he stubs out in the ashtray finally. "She got used to it after a while."

I'm tempted to ask another question, "Go ahead," he says before I think to. I glance up at him. "I know there's a second half to this question."

"Does it mean you'll answer?"

"Go ahead and ask it."

"That's not an answer." He takes out another cigarette and lights it, puffing it and glancing up at me, just as pointedly as I did him. This game of poker is much more complex than just cards. I swallow the lump in my throat. "Does that mean… do you think…" I start, twice. The words are wrong.

He sits patiently, watching me with waiting curiosity.

"And me?"

For a long moment there is nothing. The silence and the flickering light of the television in the darkened room. The glow from outside, the one coming through the drawn shades, is fading and the room feels closer, more intimate. He doesn't say a word, and the colored glow on his face looks like some modern art piece.

"Well, aren't you going to answer?"

He blows a puff of smoke towards me, leaning forward to put his face through it, and there's a smile on his lips as he opens them to speak.

"Deal the cards."


	18. XVIII

**CB: Cat and Mouse, -XVIII-**

In the middle of dealing the next hand, she freezes, hands hovering over the cards. There are footsteps moving quickly on the stairs. She reaches over slowly and stubs out the end of her cigarette in the ashtray. She glances at the door, and then turns her eyes to mine. "Expecting company?"

"No one's supposed to know we're here, remember?" my voice is more of a hiss than I intended. She doesn't seem to notice.

"That's what I thought you'd say." She frowns and starts to reach for her jacket. Her gun is in the pocket. I saw her grab it as we left the Bebop. I catch her wrist and she glances up at me. "I'd rather go down fighting," she tugs against my hand once.

"Tell me Faye, why did you pick this place, out of all the others on Ganymede?" I ask her in a hushed whisper. "We could've gone anywhere. A better hotel. A boarding house, if you didn't feel like spending the money. But you chose this place."

"Because I've hidden out here before when the heat was a little too intense." She tugs against my hand again. "Spike, let me have my gun."

I lean in closer to her, stubbing out my cigarette with my free hand, and speak in a softer voice as the footsteps outside get louder, closer to the door of our room. "And if you've hidden out here before you know that the place isn't the nicest to be in, right?" My voice is calm, much more so than she is. More than I feel, truthfully.

"So?"

"Be quiet," I caution her, putting my other hand over her mouth. She lifts a hand to grab my wrist and loses her balance, falling across the bed and landing on the cards and trapping my arm underneath her.

For a moment she struggles, but as the footsteps outside grow louder, she goes still. The television is still on, and the only light coming out of it flickers in the dark room, casting colors across her pale skin and the sheets. A silent, moving mural. There is a loud thump that makes the fake paintings on the walls adjust themselves.

Someone just got thrown into the wall outside of our room.

I find myself holding my breath, and glance down at her. Her eyes are closed and she's not even bothering to struggle. The shouting is in some other language and the person, from the sound of it, gets thrown into the opposite wall.

I let her loose and she scrambles up, crunching the cards out of shape, but obviously not caring about that, and deposits herself in my lap. Holding onto the collar of my shirt. My tie pulls against the back of my neck. She presses her face against my neck.

"It's ok, Faye," I say softly into her ear.

She shudders against me, holding tighter. I shift a little, my ribs still bruised from that fight. I'm not invincible, after all. I'm just as mortal as everyone else that I've ever thrown in jail, or shot, killed, or beaten to a bloody pulp.

She's more afraid of all this than she thinks she is.

I put a hand up and cradle the back of her neck, hoping to be soothing. Apparently, it works, because she relaxes against me, her breathing slowing back to normal. Her hands stop clawing and trying to get into my skin.

Her body is once again pliable and soft and suddenly feminine in my lap. Her thin, slender fingers slip inside the collar of my shirt, past the undone buttons to trace the edge of the neckline of my tank top.

Just like Julia. Or like I was with her. Clumsy and unsure of myself.

It's how we are with one another, when we're not fighting. She leans up against me, hands reaching around me to encircle my neck underneath my shirt, and presses her lips to my cheek. I turn and take her lips against my own. I no longer feel the burden of continued existence. I can die now. And that makes living so much sweeter.


	19. XIX

**CB: Cat and Mouse, -XIX-**

"ISSP hailing the Bebop. Jette, are you there?"

"Bob? Is that you?" I receive the affirmative answer. "It's the same place I've always been, what's got you in such a ruffle?"

"Your partner's apparently gotten in over even his head this time. When was the last time you saw Spike?"

"A week and a half ago. He took off after some woman. I never found either of them after that tip you sent my way."

"Say what you like, but I know you were there, Jette."

"Think what you like." I turn from the viewscreen and lean against the railing next to the observatory windows.

"Well I got a little bit of scratch on that girl you said he was following. Your friend, Faye. Valentine."

"What made you look into it?"

"The same reason I sent you the heads up about the Syndicate activity on Ganymede," Bob says. "Anyway, Miss Valentine, was in cryogenic sleep since an accident that happened just about half a century ago. And Valentine's not her real family name. It took some digging, since most of the records from that era were lost, or covered up."

"Covered up?"

"Your partner's hot handed girlfriend isn't who you think she is. A lot of people went to trouble to make sure she wasn't traced to that hospital."

"So. Are you going to tell me what you know, or are we going to have a circle of a conversation that goes nowhere?"

"Her real name is Faye Kaplan. Her family was connected with the group that funded the gate experiments seventy five years ago, and they made a lot of money on it."

I ponder that statement, but he goes on.

"The family was very wealthy, and young Faye was the jewel of her father's eye, so to speak, or at least from what records I've found. Everything was going fine for them, until an accident on a space ship, which killed her mother. That was the same accident that forced young Faye to be put in cryogenic sleep."

"There's more?" The pause is pregnant and expectant. I ask.

"The Kaplan family went on to found the strongest branch of the Syndicate."

". so you're saying Faye is.?"

"A distant grandmother of the current heads of the White Tigers, perhaps. She wouldn't be much more than a figurehead, if they even remember that she exists."

"I wouldn't be so sure that they don't."

"I wonder if the reason they're after her has to do with something that Mr. Kaplan, the original one, did with part of his resources."

"Huh?"

"Apparently there's a part of the Kaplan fortune that was either invested in something fifty years ago, or hidden in some account that none of the current family members know how to access."

"It would certainly explain their sudden urge to rekindle family ties." I ponder that for a long moment. If this is true, and Bob wouldn't call me if it wasn't, then it means that I just sent them into the worst situation possible. If that's true then I've just written them off and I-

"Jette?"

"Huh?"

"You seem pretty pensive all of the sudden. Something wrong?"

"Nothing. And I'll forget you said anything. All the same, thanks for the info."


	20. XX

**CB: Cat and Mouse, -XX-**

"Looks like somebody's in trouble."

The voice on the communicator causes me to sit up slightly. The spark of static is loud and a slam my hand over it. I glance down at Faye, but she's still got her eyes closed.

I know that voice. And the sing-songy nature of the phrase that was spoken.

We are still lying there, wrapped in the sheets, and with the cards still scattered under us. She's finally asleep, more than lightly, like before. And then, after shutting off the communicator, I hear the footsteps outside. They are trying to be quiet, but not very well, considering the number of them, and the state of the stairs outside of our room.

Gently, I tighten my hand on her back, nudging her just enough to wake her. She opens her eyes slowly, and glares at me. I motion her to silence, and her breath catches in her throat. The footsteps have stopped. But she heard them. I tip my head towards the door.

Her eyes follow, and she turns her head to look at the pile of clothing to the side of the bed. Slowly, I reach a hand over, and scoop up her clothes.

The look on her face as she slips into her clothing asks me if I plan to do the same. Instead, I reach back over and hand her the gun from her jacket. She opens her mouth to ask me a question, but I put a finger to her lips. She's crouched on the bed next to me. Barefoot with the sticky cards beneath her. They cling to me as well.

The door is kicked open.

I push the gun against my chest.

Whatever the men barging in were expecting to find, it certainly wasn't this.

Faye's eyes, as she turns them back to look at me from the men, are angry.

The men in the doorway pause for a moment, blinking.

"Don't just stand there, get her off me! She's trying to kill me!"

She starts to talk, but the leader, a dark haired man in the hallway, breaks up the chuckles as he steps into the room. "I'm certain that's exactly what you'd like us to think, Spike Spiegel."

She turns the gun on the guy, and even from this angle I can tell that she's got the center of his forehead straight in her sights. "What's this all about?" she asks, voice cool.

She's most dangerous when she's calm like that.

"We'd like you to come and take a little trip with us, Miss Kaplan."

I arch an eyebrow at her, but she's not looking at me. Her eyes narrow, slightly, and her jaw tightens. "That's not my name. I don't know who you are, or what you're talking about-"

"Ah, but the look on your face says otherwise, Miss Faye," and then I notice it about him. The set of his shoulders, the mark on his collar.

He's a syndicate man.

A White Tiger.

Well, if what he just called her is true, at least I doubt that they're going to hurt her. "I don't care what the 'look on my face' says to you, I want you to get out of here."

"And I've already informed you that I've been instructed to escort you for a conversation. Present company excluded, of course. There's not much I can do to him, given his… affiliations, but we're not the only ones that know where the two of you are."

She lifts the gun and fires it at the ceiling in anger. "Leave him out of this." The gun swings back down and I see the guy swallow a lump in his throat.

I put a hand on her shoulder.

She flinches for a moment.

"There are more of them than there are of us, Faye. I think maybe it's best if you go with them, for now."

Her eyes, as she looks at me, are rebellious. They ask a hundred questions and none at all. She doesn't like this idea. She doesn't know how we'll meet back up. She doesn't know if I'll even make it out of the hotel room.

"I'm sure I'll catch up with you later," I say, in way of reassuring her.

"I promise he won't be harmed."

"By you," she corrects. She narrows her eyes at the dark haired young man who has an even expression on his serious face, and then she turns back to me, and does one thing I didn't expect her to do with so many Syndicate henchmen in the room.

She takes my face in one of her hands, smooth and soft as it is, and pulls it forward, kissing me.

I blink, noticing over her shoulder how the leader of the little group tightens his jaw in response, and she pulls away, lowering the gun from his forehead. "Where are my shoes?" she asks, casually as she slides off the edge of the bed and gets to her feet, scooping up her jacket in the process.

The other White Tigers exit the room, but the dark haired guy kneels to collect her boots from by the door and offers them to her.

She must really be one of them.

It must really be her name.

She steps into her boots and shoves her gun into the pocket of her jacket, motioning the guy to leave before her. He does so, and she moves to follow him, pausing at the door to look at me again.

"Was this how it was with-"

"Sometimes."

"Be careful," she says finally, closing the door firmly behind her.


End file.
